Well after spending pretty much the whole season in San Diego on military duty, I made it home for the last couple weeks of the season and it started out pretty crappy.
I was given permission to hunt a smaller property on the island by a guy and my buddy threw some bait out a couple weeks ago and hung a trail cam. Got a couple decent bucks and some does coming in. Good enough! I just want to fill the freezer and time is short. Well Friday night I make it back to WA and my buddy tells me that someone else was also given permission to hunt the property this year and that he was pretty sure he shot something. He had a feed block out right where I was hunting and actually used my tree stand that was out there. I guess he also cleared my buddy's card on his trail cam. No biggie I'll just go to another property I have permission to hunt on.
Earlier in the season while I was in CA, my co-hunter of this property asked if his brother could try for his first deer out of my stand. No problem. He ended up getting a nice little 3x2. I told them to just leave my ladder stand up until I got back because I had planned on moving it to a different part of the property. Besides, no one would mess with it on private property, right? Wrong!!! When I went to move it, it was gone. Some one snatched it up! Now I'm getting a little irritated!
So I move to a different spot, throw up a camera and hunt Sunday night. I don't see a thing. I check the camera yesterday morning and have one picture of a dog at 1 a.m. So this morning I decide to spend the morning in the duck blind (got a couple too) and I check the cam afterwards. BOOM! There are deer and one is a nice 4x4. I'm hunting tonight! About 15 minutes before last light he roles in to about 20 yards, arrow flies, off he goes. It took a little tracking with the help of some great guys, who dropped what they were doing and came to my aid, but we got him. The arrow passed through but I ended up hitting him a little high and back. Well, he is at my house now. Thank you God! Not a monster, but I am thrilled! Two days of hunting and I get one on the ground? That never happens. Definitely makes up for the crappy way my season started.
I hope this post makes sense. I'm pretty tired right now.
